Tell the government about your experiences with PIP

Personal Independence Payment (PIP) was introduced in April 2013. It is the new disability benefit that will eventually replace Disability Living Allowance (DLA). Those newly seeking support today will now be applying for support through PIP rather than Disability Living Allowance.

One year on since implementation, the Government has convened an independent panel to seek feedback on people’s experiences of the benefit. Aspire would like anyone who has applied for PIP to be a part of this process and make sure that they complete the survey linked below. The contribution you make will help the independent panel to make recommendations on what the government should do to improve things.

Take part in the consultation by clicking on this link http://survey.dwp.gov.uk/index.php?sid=63591&lang=en

Personal Independence Payment delays causing unnecessary hardship

Aspire is concerned with the roll out of the new Personal Independence Payment benefit and the hardship that delays in the system are causing to people with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI). This is of particular concern to those who have been newly injured and are having to wait for months before they received their Personal Independence Payment entitlements. The catalogue of errors and delays experienced by Steve who sustained a Spinal Cord Injury in 2013 is something we believe no one should experience.

On 29^th June 2013, while Steve was still a patient at the NHS Spinal Cord Injury Centre in Sheffield, he completed part I of his Personal Independence Payment claim. He received his first PIP payment on 5^th December 2013. What Steve experienced during this time period is unacceptable.

First of all, Steve felt that the form was incredibly difficult to complete.

“With the amount of information that they ask for, in a lot of places, it feels like an attempt to try and catch you out.”

Secondly, Steve was given dates for potential assessments that Capita were unable to commit to themselves. On one occasion, the assessor did not turn up at the arranged time. When Steve phoned the Capita advice line, he was told that his assessment had been cancelled. Unfortunately, they had failed to tell Steve this.

When the Assessor did turn up, there was a computer error and they were unable to access any files that Steve had sent as part of his claim.

“The whole process was unnecessarily bureaucratic. It was a concerning time for me… absolutely unbearable. Missing appointments, not letting me know. It is a totally inadequate service.”

Steve received help from his Member of Parliament and Aspire was there to help every step of the way. He was able to fight his corner and raise the issue on Capita’s agenda to the extent that senior staff at the organisation’s PIP operation took action. We know that Steve is not alone. We are even more concerned about people who are going through the system without adequate support who do not raise their voices loud enough.  

We accept that where people do successfully receive entitlements, payments are backdated. However, the financial impact that this has on people, especially at a time when they most need additional income to meet costs after having a life changing injury, is devastating. It hinders people’s ability to get on with their lives and be more independent. In one case, Aspire found someone wearing jumpers and gloves in their own home because of the financial difficulty they were facing following their injury. 

Furthermore, we are concerned with the contractors’ ability to cope when reassessments are rolled out on a national scale. The government expects all DLA claimants to have been invited on to Personal Independence Payments by September 2017. With 3.3 million people receiving DLA, this requires on average 825,000 assessments a year, or 16,000 assessments a week, or 3,200 assessments a day. This does not even include new people entering the system.

With so many people affected, it is no surprise that the government had to rethink their approach last year and introduce a more phased reassessment timetable.

As people are going through the process for the new benefit, we are already receiving feedback from people and having to make representations on their behalf to the Department for Work and Pensions and the assessment providers. Indeed our introduction of a new Welfare Benefits Advice Service is testament to the additional support we anticipate we will have to provide to people with SCI as a result of multiple benefit changes.

If you have Spinal Cord Injury and are experiencing any problems with any welfare benefits issues, contact Aspire’s new Welfare Benefits Advice Service on 020 8420 6711 or email welfarebenefits@aspire.org.uk

(*Steve is not the individual's real name) 

Aspire meets Shadow Minister

Last week, Aspire met Kate Green MP, the Shadow Minister for Disabled People, to talk about the work of the Charity and also raise our concerns about the rollout of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) Benefit. PIP is the new benefit that is due to replace Disability Living Allowance (DLA).

Kate only recently became the Shadow Minister towards the end of 2013 and this was the first time that we had an opportunity to directly speak to the Shadow Minister. Kate has an impressive background in the charity sector. Before she became a Member of Parliament, she was the Chief Executive of the Child Poverty Action Group.

She showed particular interest in Aspire’s Housing Programme and how we worked with NHS Spinal Cord Injury Centres to offer temporary housing to newly injured patients who had no access to accessible housing after being paralysed. The fact that 20% of people with SCI are discharged to nursinghomes is a shocking statistic and Kate thought so too.

Kate was happy to work with Aspire to raise the issues that were affecting people with Spinal Cord Injuries. We raised our concerns about the new Personal Independence Payment benefit as people have already started coming to Aspire because of delays throughout the whole system. Kate will be raising these issues in Parliament when the opportunity arises.

Aspire will continue working to influence all political parties on behalf of the 40,000 people with SCI in the UK and ensure that that their experiences and views are represented in the process. This is a crucial time to be speaking to Parties who are beginning to shape their offering to the electorate in the lead up to the 2015 General Elections.  

Does the UK expect too little of disabled people?

64% of working age disabled people are unemployed, and those paralysed by Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) are no exception when it comes to the many difficulties faced when finding work. As a charity offering practical support to spinal injured people, disability, benefits and employment are always high on the agenda as elements affecting opportunity, choice and independence.

We’re a bit late with this, but a week or so on and we’re still disappointed with Dr Stephen Duckworth’s comments about disabled people and employment. You see, we think that disabled people should expect more from Britain, not the other way round as Dr Duckworth suggested.
Duckworth, the chief executive for Capita’s Personal Independence Payment (PIP) assessment services, angered many disabled people recently when he stated that “north of a million” people currently claiming disability benefits should not be. In a rather confusing interview with the Sunday Times, Dr Duckworth suggested, without providing any evidence, that many of those claiming disability related benefits were not really disabled and merely had ‘trivial injuries’.  Appearing to switch between talking about Disability Living Allowance (DLA)/PIP, which he has previously acknowledged is an important and ‘enabling’ benefit, and Employment Support Allowance (ESA), he said Britain had failed disabled people by not expecting more from them. This expectation appears to mean an expectation to work with Dr Duckworth asserting that, “It is far better to go back to work to get better than to wait to get better to get back to work. Use work as a therapeutic intervention.”

Aspire agrees that there are merits to working and that many disabled people currently not working should be. Being in employment, volunteering, education or training has repeatedly been shown as having mental and physical health benefits. However, just because someone is looking for work there is no guarantee they will find employment. Despite legislation like the Disability Discrimination Act and now the Equality Act, disabled people are more than four times more likely to be involuntarily out of work than non-disabled people. And almost 60% of adults with impairments experience barriers in the type and amount of paid work they do. In an already competitive jobs market, though, where discrimination is still being fought, the notion that employers should take on staff who are in need of paid ‘therapeutic intervention’ is hardly likely to improve things for disabled people. Indeed, the situation is already compounded by the threat that many disabled people who currently receive DLA will no longer do so under the new PIP system. DLA/PIP is, in Dr Duckworth’s own words, “an enabling benefit...that in part removes some of the additional costs, which are imposed as a result of the disabling barriers that society imposes” on disabled people. The government has said it expects 20% less people to receive PIP than currently receive DLA. This may prevent many of this 20% who currently work from doing so due not being able to mitigate some of those disabling barriers through receiving DLA/PIP. Perhaps this is something Dr Duckworth should be more concerned about rather than appearing to attempt to dismiss those receiving ESA as not ‘really’ disabled.

Because Dr Duckworth is himself disabled, his words appear to be given extra weight and this is problematic on several levels. Disabled people are not a homogeneous group and different impairments affect people differently. Even those with a similar impairment to Dr Duckworth may not experience the same barriers to employment or the same experience of impairment. For example, being able to afford a top end wheelchair can make both moving around and remaining in your wheelchair much easier than the sort of standard wheelchairs most people receive through NHS provision. Also not everyone with a SCI will experience the same levels of pain, spasms, mental health response to major trauma, bladder and bowel management, and so on. Unfortunately, Dr Duckworth appears to be being held up as a disabled role model, an example of how to ‘overcome’ disability. However, no two people’s lived experience of disability is the same and focusing on the structural barriers which can lead to the higher rates of employment amongst disabled people is crucial.

It is a shame that his comments add to the general public’s confusion over the difference between ESA, which is an out of work benefit, and DLA/PIP, which is aimed at alleviating some of the additional costs of disability regardless of whether someone is in or out of work. At the same time, his words add to the idea that if disabled people just tried harder they could work, and don’t address the more pertinent issues of what employers could do to enable more disabled people to work. Disability and employment is a hugely important discussion that has to take place. But if we’re to see sensible discussions with positive outcomes, then both those speaking and those reporting on the discussions have to ensure that they are coming from a position of sound evidence and clear understanding of the bigger issues.